X-men Apocalypse: surprisingly entertaining

After the slew of superheroes movies lately, there is this uncomfortable feeling of "jelak" as they are churning out formulaic movies, trying harder and harder to give these fictional character deeper and deeper layers, and making them more real. Some are good, some are horrendous, most are average, but once in a while, we get Deadpool, which was unconventional.


After Batman vs Superman (which I had not seen yet), we got the well received Captain America Civil War, which I thought was over rated. Not so long later, we got X Men Apocalypse. After my lack of interest in Avengers, after what they did to Days of Future Past, and with early poor reception of Apocalypse, I was bit wary stepping into the cinema. Boy, was I in for a surprise.



Far from unconventional like Deadpool, Apocalypse did the opposite by sticking very closely to the old formula of super hero movie. Hero vs super baddie. Lost in the early battle. Super hero become stronger and band together, and together they defeated the villain. There was not much gray area where the villain is just misunderstood. Apocalypse is the current villain, and do make a menacing one. The 4 horsemen of doom, on the other hand, is less than menacing. The story follows the awakening of Apocalypse and his mission of destroying the current world. Joining the team of X Men, the band of Cyclops, Jean Grey, Quick Silver, Prof X, Mystique, Beast, Nightcrawler finally defeated the villain with the help of Storm and Magneto (spoiler? everyone know that Storm is part of X Men later).


The action is fast paced, adequate humour at the correct moment, and at certain point, the movie did make fun of its own franchise. Forget much character development, or complex background story but making Magneto into a tormented soul is a nice touch, and even touching to a certain extent. There is multiple Easter eggs around for those who are familiar with the X Men stories, from project X (which made Wolverine) to phoenix story arch, Jubilee and even the building of danger room with Sentinels as training opponents. The only drawback is I really do not like how they made Mystique into such a good character (come on, Mystique is such a good villain, why turn her into the good side just because J Law is playing her? It is like turning Syler into the good guy in Heroes TV series)


Do not expect a movie as memorable and dark as The Dark Knight trilogy or unconventional like Deadpool, but this movie still entertain by keeping to a good old formula of good guys vs bad guys.

ratings: 3 half poink~!
comments: surprisingly I actually enjoyed this more than Civil War. If only they have Gambit. And if only they have Mr Sinister in the next movie or even Magneto's Avalon story arch.....

STG Tea House Cafe: memorable dining experience

old bungalow converted to diner

It is our 7th wedding anniversary, and we are craving for western food instead of our usual char-kueitiao. Even though Hot Jack immediately pop in my mind, we decided to give Sabah Tea Garden STG Tea House a try, since it is so near our place. Ipoh resident would be familiar with STG, which sit in the same league with the fine dining category; some even say at par with Indulgence. It is situated in one of the old bungalow building in Chateau Garden. Just drive along Jalan Gopeng, look for the turn after across Impiana hotel.

Although it is a rather small bungalow, there are ample parking space, and the setup is rather homey. It is so comfortable dining here, coupled with the attentive staff. The menu is typical western with a few local fried rice in the midst. Expect some pasta dish as well, with the usual soup appetizer and the meat/ chicken/ fish entree. Compare with the other fine dining restaurant with similar setting, STG do boast of a more reasonable pricing in Ipoh.

seared sea bass

chicken divan

creme brulee

Do not expect much from the drinks, juices start at RM9, and my Sabah Peach tea is priced at RM8/ glass. I prefer my tea stronger, surprisingly for diner with tea background, I felt tea is one of their weaker link. Fret not, for the food does make up for the drink. The chicken divan (RM25) is grilled nicely with a tinge of herbs. The butter sauce tasted good, but I prefer it to be creamier. Still a good dish, though not the best chicken dish out there. The pan seared sea bass fillet (RM26), on the other hand, is cooked to perfection. The herbs blended flawlessly with the fillet seasoned with salt. Eaten with the creamy sauce, I could not think of any way to improve the dish. While the food ranges from average to impressive, the dessert is simply out of this world. The creme brulee (RM10) tasted so good, while not too sweet but had the perfect balance of taste. Most dessert taste good but have a heavy after taste, but no, the creme brulee here is simply light and nice. The winner has to be the chocolate lava cake (RM15). The 15 minute wait is so worth it, served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, eating it with the hot melting chocolate flowing it from the cake simply lifted me up to 9th heaven. The cake has the perfect balance of chocolate taste, not too sweet, not too bitter, and yet chocolate-ty enough.

Taste wise, it is may not be everyone's cup of tea, but considering other similar class diner, STG has to be one of the top few. The food is priced nicely for Ipoh folks, and the food is enjoyable. Did I mention about the dessert? Yup, that itself makes the trip here worth the time.

ratings: 3 half poink~!
comments: Although I am not a fan of chocolate, but I still have to give the lava cake a double thumbs up.




STG Tea House Cafe
2, Taman Kinta,
Taman Chateau
Ipoh
052550188, 052550116

Busan: the city of art

Yongdusan Park

After our adventure in Jeju, we make our way up north into Busan. Again, we made so many adjustment last minute, and drop many destination as my initial itienarary appeared too ambitious. Luckily, we kept a day or 2 as buffer, which we manage to use to complete our venture into Busan.

food:
any seafood would be fresh here.
dong-na pajeon: pancake
bokguk: soup with pufferfish
ssiat hotteok: hotteok filled with nuts
dwaeji gukbap: rice and pork soup
milmyeon: Busan version of cold noodle
eomuk: fish cake derivatives

transport:
Metro would be the choice, but some of the tourist spots require bus transfer. there is a one day pass which is worth it if there are 3-4 trips per day. Using transport card (T money/ Cashbee), there will be discount if transfer to another transport within half hour of exiting the first one, so sometimes, using transport card is more convenient.



budget:
total budget for 5 Nights in Busan for 2:
accommodation: RM 657
food:                   150K won
transport:            79K won
admissions:        6K won
grand total:        RM 1488 (1K won to RM3.53)

Grand total for the whole South Korea trip (for 2)
Jeju:     RM 1955
Busan: RM 1488
flight:  RM 2516 (for Airasia + Air Busan)
Others RM 398 (International Driving Permit, Travel Insurance, taxi from Ipoh- Aman Jaya, Bus from Ipoh- KLIA2)
Grand total: RM6357 (cost exclude souvenirs)

stay:
there are many areas, the beach-side being the popular ones. Seomyeon, on the other hand, is central with lots of food and shopping selections. While hostel is the smart choice in Jeju, there are lack of this similar accommodation here. Love hotels, on the other hand, are abundant. Although it may not be everyone's cup of tea, but it is actually a safe place to stay. Many of the patrons here are actually tourists from other countries. For a fragment of price, we had a big hotel room, room service everyday, the usual complimentary daily coffees, a super big LCD TV with 60+ legit Korean channel, and best of all, a wifi AND personal desktop in the room (which I used to write this blog)

realxing afternoon

actual itinerary
D1: travel day
arriving in Gimhae from Jeju, we took the metro to Seomyeon, where we left our luggage in our hotel, W Motel Busan. Since it is Easter Sunday, we visited New Philadelphia Church. It is a small non denominational church, and worshiping here is very comfortable. Since we travel in the morning, we took the rest of the evening off and lepak around Seomyeon.
Busan Museum of Art: free museum with small collection of modern art. Why not visit since there are no charge?
Seomyeon area is full of eateries, we ended up here nearly every night and yet, we still find new place every time.

D2: Metro Line 1
Taejongdae Park: shore with magnificient views.
Lotte Gwangbok for the cascading muscial fountain (close on mon),
Yeongdo Bridge: draw bridge, lifted once a day.
Jagalchi Market and surrounding area, Bupyeong market, Gukje Market, BIFF square: all cluster together for great food. Jagalchi is famous for fresh sea product, which expectedly do not come cheap. There is also a night market in Bupyeong as well.
Yongdusan park: the usual park with lots of locals. Busan tower is here as well with the expected love locks. Not a must but do come since it is within the vicinity.

Beomeosa Temple

Shinsegae Mall: supposedly biggest mall in the world makes night shopping here exciting.
Busan Cinema Center: the official cinema for Busan International Film Festival. Do come if within the vicinity,  for the beautiful light display on the ceiling daily.

D3: Metro line 2
spent the morning doing some shopping in Lotte Seomyeon.
UN Memorial Cemetery: the only cemetery managed by UN, mainly for those who gave up their lives during Korean War. If walking is possible, try to visit UN Peace Memorial Hall uphill (NOT the same as memorial cemetery), a UN museum dedicated to Korean war, with lots of interesting exhibits. To further appreciate the cemetery, it will be more informative to visit the museum first prior to cemetery (though quite far) to fully appreciate the history behind.
Busan Museum: besides the cemetery, free entry but exhibits focused more on history of Busan.
Haedong Yonggungsa Temple: temple facing the sea. good photo opportunity, but may not be worth the trip for some.
Haeundae Beach: popular beach, especially during summer. Slightly more upscale, and many other attractions such as the aquarium (which we did not visit) are here as well.
Dalmaji Hill/ Moontan road: short hill trail hike with views of the seaside. One of the place to appreciate cherry blossom in Busan.
We went shopping at Shinsegae again at night, and back to Seomyeon for dinner.

Cherry Blossom in Jinhae

D4: Outskirt of Busan
Beomeosa Temple: a fully functional temple complex with a few hiking trail. Less busy than Yonnggusa temple.
Busan Gamcheon Cultural Village: will top my list of must-visit in Busan. A fully inhabited village, on a hill slope. It is a feast for the eyes, with the colorful houses, multiple art piece along the road, plenty of house rennovated into mini art museum, and plenty of picture opportunity. Buy the map, and we even went on a art scavenger hunt which made my whole afternoon here truly enjoyable.
Gangwan beach: come at night, and we were able to watch the colorful illuminated beach. However, the fun here lies more on the equally colorful beach side, a good mixture of food, restaurants and relaxing stroll along the beach.
No prize guessing that although we had our naengmyeon here, we still went back to Seomyeon for our proper dinner.

D5: daytrip to Jinhae
There are frequent bus ride to Jinhae so there is no need to get our ticket before hand. Jinhae is famous as THE place for cherry blossom, so we time out visit so it coincide with the cherry blossom festival. To appreciate fully the festival (with the activities), it is still best to come during the festival, but in order to avoid some of the crowd, it will be wiser to come earlier. The cherry blossom is blooming, the street is full of food, and the crowds is starting to build up.
Yeojwa Stream: The river is nicely decorated, the the hanging cherry blossom over the river makes it one of the top place to appreciate the flowers. However, since it is near the bus and railway station, there is a huge crowd here.
Geonghwa train station: The railway station is a better place to fully appreciate cherry blossom, although smaller in size.

Jinhae

D6: travel back to KLIA2

Southern part of South Korea, although may not be as compact as Seoul, do has its charm. Jeju, although with lots of man-made attractions, still appeals with its equal numbers of natural attractions. Busan, is a pleasant surprise, with so many food choices, and interesting visits. Definitely a destination to consider.
For the previous post on Jeju, click here

ratings: 4 poink~!
comments: for a snapshot of Korea, Seoul would be a better choice. For people with lots of time, Seoul-Jeju-Busan is doable in one half week. However, for people like me, who actually want to relax and do things my own pace, Busan-Jeju is a nice getaway for a week plus.

Jeju: truly island of man-made wonders

spring in Jeju

South Korea is indeed one of the most connected country in the world. Internet is so common, that wifi is widely available in all the budget accommodation we stayed. The most wonderful surprise is that in our Busan leg, we even had a personal PC and wifi in our room, something that we do not even get in our 5 star hotel back in Malaysia (and we stayed in budget love hotel in Busan). And to begin, we start our journey with our Jeju leg.

stay:
there are only few towns which are popular:
Jeju-si: nearest to airport, more happening, more food choice, lots of budget accommodation but far from most tourist attractions
Seogwipo: down south, smaller, although favorite with lots of people, we found that there are limited choice of food here. However, logistically, basing here makes travel much easier.
Jungmun: logistic convenient, but appears to be more expensive.

Food:
black pork, which is local delicacy to Jeju, usually by BBQ
raw seafood (okdom/ sea urchin/ hairtail fish)
omaegi tteok (black glutinous rice cake): "kuih" with red bean
abalone rice porridge
any products with tangerine (gamgyul) and hallabong (with protruding stem)


transport:
for bus, there are intercity and inner-city bus. Be careful though, the bus route to and fro may be different. In worse case scenario, which happened to us a few times, we had to go back to airport (easiest to spot in any bus schedule) to change to another bus. Bus do accept Cashbee card so there are no logistics problems in travelling with bus.
The usual question people asked: why book a car, not taxi (as recommended by lots of people) or just bus? Follow my argument:
bus: the most budget way to travel in Jeju, but given the erratic schedule, and lots of attraction is not near the bus-stop, you may need to waste lots of time going from one place to another. Viable option if budget is limited, have lots of time or not planning to cover lots of attraction.
taxi: save time as the driver would know most of the place, but with online search, the range for a taxi would cost easily 120K-150K for 8 hours, and some of the driver may not be so accommodating especially in choosing place to eat. Just compare our budget above which we use the same expenditures for 2 half days of car plus petrol instead of one day of taxi. Taxi is still a good option if you have 4 persons in a group and have very limited time in Jeju.
Driving around in Jeju may need some time to adjust to, such as they drive on the right (Malaysian drive on the left), red/ green light in the traffic light usually refers to going straight and turning right while turning left/U turn have another green light (the usual traffic light have 4 lights), and they have lots, lots of traffic camera. Fear not, as the GPS is so efficient that it also serves as a warning beacon for speed camera. Just key in the phone number in the GPS, and it will do the rest of the navigating. I had even listed down the phone number for GPS in this blog.

view from Seongsan Ichilbong

Budget:
For 4 nights in Jeju, total expenditures for 2
accommodation: RM 527
Food:                  140K won
transport:            158K won (including car rent)
admission:          106K won
grand total for Jeju leg: RM1955 (with exchange of 1K won to RM 3.53)
For total expenditures of the trip, refer to Busan post.

The actual journey:
For those who manage to get hold of my detailed itinerary, you may find that our actual journey varies much from the intended steps. I made some last minute changes and cancel lots of the destination; sometimes we spent more time in places that we like so we had to make some sacrifice in the other places. Take note also that Jeju always have at least 2 of the same attraction type, so usually we just choose one.

D1: travel day
our travelling day, with AirAsia arriving in Busan, and check in with Air Busan to fly to Jeju island. We reached at night 9 pm, but still find enough time to buy Cashbee JejuPass from 7-11 at the airport. (hindnote: forget the Jejupass and just go for any Cashbee in any convenient mart, we hardly use the Jejupass discount, luckily it is not much difference from the normal Cashbee card (3000 KRW). With accurate instruction from Hostel Lyndon, we manage to jump into bus 100 to reach our hotel. Hostel Lyndon is one of the recommended place to stay in Jeju-si, near to airport and to our Muslim country-mates as they even provide halal cooking utensil. This is a youth hostel but a very comfortable one, with free breakfast and lots of other convenience. Most of their room even have attached toilet, which is the main reason why we booked our room with them. The staff can speak English well, which proves helpful in lots of situation.

Seopikoji

D2: Jeju north to east
after a good night rest, we went to Lotte car rent (used to be KT Kumho) to take our booked Kia Morning. Of course, we booked our car online before we reach, as there are a big online discount (even more if it is your birthday month). Kia morning is a small 1L compact car, but comfortable to handle with lots of Korean technology in the dashboard (very similar to my own Elantra).
Yongdam Rock (7283918) : Rock that shapes like a dragon. Nice to look at, but do not need to spend too long here.
Manjanggul Caves (7834818): caves made from lava tubes. Wonderful nature walk in the caves, expect to spend at least 1 hour here. It may be dark and wet so be prepare. We were hungry so we ate lunch here.
Gimnyeong Maze (7829266): decent size maze just outside Manjanggul. We were told fastest to complete is 10 min, but we took a decent 15 min, and our fast exit is attributed to  a smart "ajusan" whom we tailed.
Seongsan Ichilbung sunrise peak: quite a easy climb, but still expect at least 1-2 hours here. The peak is worth the climb, and there is haenyo demo down at the bottom (not guaranteed everyday, due to weather reasons) at 1pm, 3pm.
Seopikoji (7820080): seaside park, relaxing way to spend the evening, but only if there is enough time.
Seongeup Cultural Village: this is NOT a park, but rather a modern kampung with traditional houses which can be visited for free. There are lots of restaurant here, which are favourite among lots of bloggers.
We try visit the trick art museum near Seongeup but we were too late so we were forced to visit Alive Museum in Jungmun the next day.

Glass Castle

We end our day with our check in at Minjonggak Hostel in Seogwipo. We moved our base to Seogwipo for the next 2 days as it is logistically much easier to move around in the south rather than doing day trip from Jeju-si (expect to drive approximately 60km one way from the north). Minjonggak is a nice comfortable hostel with attached toilet and futon instead of beds. Although the staff may not be able to speak English well, but he is very helpful. Parking is an issue in Seogwipo but luckily, the city car park open for free from 6am -9pm.

D3: southern Jeju: seogwipo and Jungmun
Jeongbang waterfall (7331530): the only waterfall that fall directly into the sea. Not a bad way to start the morning, average compare to the other 2 famous waterfall.
Oedolgae Rock (7328027): solitary basalt rock. go if it is on the way or a small detour, otherwise, not worth the trip.
Play Kpop (7387600): heaven for kpop fan, otherwise, may be tad expensive although there are lots of chroma blue/ green screen technology for fun inside.
Alive Museum: also within the Jungmun complex, trick art museum, good for few hours of fun.
Cheonjeyeon waterfall (7381529): the waterfall is rather disappointing, but the park is impressively big, with a nicely decorated bridge connecting the parks.
O Sulloc Museum (7945312): tea farm with comfortable cafe. Read that the green teacake is nice, but it was sold out when we were there. We manage only to try the green tea ice cream which is good. However, the farm still pale compare to Boh tea farm in Cameron Highlands.
Jeju Glass Castle (772777): lots of glass display but not focus on glass making. The enchanted forest with lots of glass is nice for a walk though.

D4: way back to Jeju-si
Mysterious road: due to optical error, cars and other objects appears to roll uphill.
Jeju Loveland (7126988): instead of art, this is more of a collection of explicit sexual sculptures. More of mature adult fun than appreciating art. Not even educational.
Return car to Lotte, with complimentary bus ride to airport.
Seogwipo Olleh Market (7621949): typical market for souvenir shopping

O Sulloc tea farm

D5: travel back to Busan.

These are some places I skipped, so I would not be able to tell whether it is worth the time or visit. Note that I totally omitted western and north west Jeju in the list as I expected there would not be adequate time:
Haenyo museum/ Jeju folk village/ Udo island/ World Eros Museum/ World Cup Stadium/ Chocolate Museum/ Hello Kitty Island/ Seogwipo Five Days Market (only open on sepcific dates)/Jusangjeolli (purely not enough time, would want to visit if there is chance)/Teddy Bear Museum (been to Seoul version, doubt there are much surprise here)/ Ripley's Believe it or Not Museum/ Yeomiji Botanical Garden/ Chocolate Land/ Mount Sanbang/ Mt Halla (initially we planned for Yeongsil path but it would take at least half a day allocation)

For the rest of the trip and our Busan leg, click for the next post.

Captain America: Civil War: blend of fun action "rojak"

Yup, it had been a quiet 2 months. DIY travel to Korea (itinerary online soon) and other familial responsibilities given me infrequent chance to blog. Nonetheless, lets make a comeback the way Marvel did the recent Captain America movie: with a loud bang.

Captain America: Civil War should be named Avengers: Civil War instead, given that so many Marvel characters that were featured, and it just continued from where Avengers: Age of Ultron ended. To cut the story short, with more and more casualties resulting from the Avengers missions, it will be soon enough when the nations decide they should not operate above the law. UN had come out with the Sokovia Accord, a motion to control the Avengers, basically rendering them to a team of pawn operating under a special UN committee. Stark/ Iron Man, with his own guilt from Sokovia, tried to persuade the whole team to sign, but Captain America head the side to oppose, with the simple reasoning that Avengers needed to be independent, free from political influence in order to battle the great evil which threaten mankind. Kind of egoistic to me, though. To muddle the matter more, Bucky Barnes appeared to bomb a UN gathering (may or may not be under influence of HYDRA, with no spoiler there), and surprisingly, a lesser powered villain Zemo (Colonel Zemo here, not Baron Zemo) was manipulating events with his own agenda.


The similar formula is followed. Many characters, both from the original (minus Thor and Hulk) Avengers, to the individual movie Ant-Man, and even preview of future projects such as Spiderman (reboot) and Black Panther. All of the actors, actress (Black Widow, of course) easily ease into their character and most of them were given ample focus (as long as do not compare to Capt/ Iron Man/ Winter Soldier). The action is fast paced, and everyone took part in the fight. However, I felt at times, there were overused of hand held camera sequence; after all, I used to have motion sickness. There is a dose of humour in the form of Ant Man and Spiderman; and also some nice one liner here and there. But, this is still far from a perfect hero movie. It was fun, but not filling enough. The movie tried to deal with a deeper layer of seriousness with the argument of freedom vs accountability, but it barely scratches the issue, choosing to focus on the action instead. While I did not actually read the true Civil War story arch, I believe that the actual story is probably better. I cant help it, after Dark Knight trilogy, it set the bar for realistic superhero movie.


Still, for the fun action sequence, the chemistry of all the characters, and watching so many superheroes on screen, this definitely is worth the ticket price. Just do not expect a main dish, its more like a fun side dish rojak.

ratings: 3 half poink~!
comments: I realize why I do not like the movie. I am in camp Iron Man, and I agree that great powers should not go unchecked. Now, back to waiting for Apocalypse vs X-Men